The U.S. government is stuck between a rock and a hard place when it comes to an American citizen who is plotting attacks against other Americans from overseas.

According to ABC News, the American citizen is now a member of al-Qaeda. The Obama administration wants to solve the problem by killing him with a drone strike, but there are some complications that come with that idea.

First of all, the CIA drones, which have been keeping an eye on him, can't complete the objective because he's a U.S. citizen and the Justice Department must have a case against him in order to do so. But there currently is no case.

Further complicating the task is the fact that he is in a country that refuses U.S. military action on its soil.

Furthermore, President Barack Obama's new policy says American suspected terrorists overseas can only be killed by the military -- not the CIA.

Obama's new guidelines, which were laid out last year in a speech, say that lethal force must only be used "to prevent or stop attacks against U.S. persons, and even then, only when capture is not feasible and no other reasonable alternatives exist to address the threat effectively." In addition, the person must also pose "a continuing, imminent threat to U.S. persons."

[SOURCE: wikimedia]

This puts some decision-making troubles on the U.S. Department of Defense's (DOD) plate. It's currently deciding whether the man is dangerous enough to justify killing an American without charging him with a crime or trying him. It also has to consider the potential international repercussions of launching the drone strike in a country that has been resistant to U.S. action.

The American suspected terrorist has been described as an al-Qaeda facilitator who has been responsible for lethal attacks against U.S. citizens overseas. Reports say he continues to plan attacks against the U.S. citizens using "improvised explosive devices."

The suspected terrorist is protected and in a pretty remote location, which makes any attempts for capture by the U.S. military risky.

Obama came under fire last year for his drone polices. Some Americans felt the killings were unconstitutional, while other Americans defended the President's stance, arguing the Constitution no longer applies when it comes to terrorism.

Meanwhile, the DOD is working on fully autonomous drones that use technologies like facial recognition to kill its targets. For instance, Boeing launched a test flight for its autonomous Phantom Eye drone back in 2012.

quote: When you allegedly go abroad and allegedly plan terrorist attacks against the United Sates -- when you allegedly talk and act like a terrorist; you allegedly keep company with terrorists -- then you deserve a trial to defend yourself against these allegations

Hate to tell you guys, but one persons terrorist is another person's freedom fighter wreaking justified karma on the United States.

That is speaking as an Atheist America born citizen by the way.

The United States is NOT the white hat in all of this. We have numerous instances in our past where we have done the wrong thing and now? It's coming back to bite us in the butt in the form of 'terrorism'.

People are getting seriously tired of people saying "The American people didn't do this!"

There is actually an argument (and a fricking good one) that since we allowed our government to do this bad stuff in the past, we are JUST as guilty as our government is.